The Penkovsky Papers - The Russian Who Spied for the West by Ed: Edward Cranshaw and Oleg Penkovsky

When Colonel Oleg Penkovsky was convicted of spying and shot in Moscow in the spring of 1963 hardly a dog barked. In the West his case was overshadowed by the trial of his English associate Mr. Grenville Wynne: in the Soviet Union the affair, though prominently featured in the press, attracted no special attention or comment. As Edward Crankshaw points out in his foreword, both Moscow and London had their own reasons, diametrically opposed, for playing down the value of the immense amount of material he had smuggled out to the West. Yet it was in fact the most cataclysmic shock that the Soviet Counter-Intelligence system had ever suffered. Its reverberations can only be compared with those of the Hiss case in America, or the Fuchs trial in this country. As it took place in Russia, we should, normally, only have the seismographic readings of the outside world on which to estimate the tremors that shook the whole Soviet military hierarchy: two Marshals dismissed, the infamous General Serov (the hangman of Hungary) publicly demoted, 300 Soviet intelligence officers immediately recalled to Moscow from posts abroad. But no less fantastic than his exploits as a spy is the fact that Penkovsky himself actually kept a record of what he was doing and why, and smuggled it out to the West. That record, that testament, that account of one of the most dramatic and dangerous spiritual journeys of our time lies between the covers of this book. It is of the first importance for what it reveals of the Soviet intelligence system, of Soviet policy-making and of the way of life of the Soviet elite. Above all, it is a humane document, artless, outraged, passionate, of breath-taking interest. From April 1961 to the end of August 1962- the period of the Berlin Wall and the mounting crisis over Cuba Penkovsky furnished the West with up to the minute information on the innermost political and military secrets, of the Soviet Union. Convinced that Khrushchev meant to plunge the world into nuclear war he used his unique position at the core of the most centralised society in the world to frustrate him by every means at his disposal with a fatal disregard of his own safety. Three times during this period he was sent to the West by his own Government. Each time he refused to seek asylum because he believed, in his own words, that as a soldier his place was in the front line. Read Penkovsky for the light he throws on the Soviet world, which is a light rarely vouchsafed to foreigners. For myself, the most fascinating and valuable parts •of the book are those which offer an inside view of the ways of life enjoyed by the Soviet elite. ..' Edward Crankshaw. This 1967 Fontana Paperback is in good condition. Spine creased; tanning.

SKU: 1517737 This image is of the actual book.

Location: Biography